PECULIARITIES OF HIGHER MENTAL FUNCTIONS OF CHILDREN WITH GENERAL HYPOPLASIA OF SPEECH
Olga S. Turko
3rd year student of the faculty of preschool, primary and special education
Belgorod State National Research University,
Belgorod
Scientific supervisor
Alexander V. Markov
senior lecturer
Foreign languages department
NRU BSU
Abstract. The article deals with the development of speech, cognitive and motor spheres of children with general hypoplasia of speech. Attention is paid to the differences in the formation of higher mental functions in children of this group and children in the norm. The importance of taking into account the peculiarities of the development of children of this group when organizing the processes of education and upbringing is noted. The article will be useful to teachers, speech therapists, as well as parents.
Key words: general hypoplasia of speech, speech, thinking, memory, attention, perception, higher mental functions, violation, cognitive activity, motor sphere.
Pronunciation errors in children with a general hypoplasia of speech are assessed differently: some affect only the nuances of phonemes and do not disturb the meaning of the utterance. Children with phonemic disorders show a general blurring of speech, lack of expression and clarity.
The incorrect acquisition of the patterns of language leads to violations of the morphological structure of words and syntactic structure of sentences.
One of the characteristic features of the speech development of children with a general hypoplasia of speech is a more significant gap in the volume of passive and active vocabulary than in the norm. Preschoolers with a general hypoplasia of speech understand the meanings of many words, the composition of their passive vocabulary is within the age norm or close to it. However, the use of familiar words in independent speech causes them difficulties.
Children with a general hypoplasia of speech lag far behind their peers with normal speech development when it comes to the actualization of predicative vocabulary (verbs, adjectives). Preschoolers with a general hypoplasia of speech have difficulties in understanding and using many qualitative adjectives used in the speech of their normally developing peers (narrow, sour, spotty, wavy). The verb vocabulary of preschoolers with general hypoplasia of speech is dominated by words denoting simple actions that the child himself or herself performs or observes on a daily basis. It is very difficult for such children to learn and use generalization words of abstract meaning, which denote signs, states, qualities, assessments. Vocabulary formation disorder in these children is expressed in ignorance of many words, difficulties in searching for a known word, violation of the actualisation of passive vocabulary.
One of the most difficult tasks of work with children with general hypoplasia of speech is the formation of grammatical structure of speech. It is more difficult than mastering passive and active vocabulary. This is due to the fact that grammatical meanings are always more abstract than lexical ones, and the grammatical system of language is organized on the basis of a large number of language rules.
Children with a general hypoplasia of speech go through the same stages of speech formation as children without speech pathology. Grammatical forms of word change, word formation, types of sentences appear in children with general hypoplasia of speech, as a rule, in the same sequence as in normal speech development, but it happens much later than the age norm. Analysis of the speech of children with a general hypoplasia of speech reveals violations in their mastery of both morphological and syntactic units. The impaired formation of grammatical operations leads to a large number of morphological errors in speech.
There is an inaccurate use of many lexical meanings. The active vocabulary is dominated by nouns and verbs. There is a lack of words denoting qualities, attributes, states of objects and actions. The inability to use word formation methods creates difficulties in the use of word variants, children do not always manage to select the same root words, form new words with the help of suffixes and prefixes. Often they substitute the right word for another word with a similar meaning. Simple extended sentences predominate in free utterances, and complex constructions are almost never used.
R.E. Levina notes agrammatisms in the speech of children with general hypoplasia of speech: errors in the coordination of numerals with nouns, adjectives with nouns in gender, number and case. A large number of errors are observed in the use of both simple and complex prepositions.
Deficiencies in the use of vocabulary, grammar, sound pronunciation are clearly evident in various forms of coherent monological speech (retelling, composing a story based on one or a targeted series of pictures, preparing a story-description).
V.I. Artemova and V.I. Lakhmotkina point out in their article that the limited vocabulary, the lag in mastering the grammatical native language structure hinder the process of developing coherent speech, the transition from the dialogic form of speech to the contextual one. While correctly understanding the logical relationships between events, children are limited to listing actions. When retelling, children make mistakes in conveying the logical sequence of events, missing individual links.
In addition, the need for experimental research and special systematic work to form children's skills of coherent statements is evidenced by the data of the study of the state of coherent speech of students in the junior school for children with speech disorders. Thus, according to L.F. Spirova and A.V. Yastrebova, by the beginning of schooling the level of formation of lexico-grammatical means of language in them lags far behind the norm. L.M. Kusova and E.I. Ryabova write in their article that independent coherent contextual speech in elementary school children remains imperfect for a long time: there are difficulties in programming statements, in the selection of material, in lexico-grammatical structuring of statements, violations of coherence and consistency of the statement. This creates additional difficulties for children in the learning process.
General speech impairment affects the formation of children's intellectual, sensory and volitional spheres.
A.V. Tivikova, A.S. Filatova and other authors point out the connection between speech disorders and other aspects of mental development, causing the presence of secondary defects. For example, while they have full-fledged prerequisites for mastering thinking operations (comparison, classification, analysis, synthesis), children lag behind in the development of verbal-logical thinking and find it difficult to master thinking operations.
Children with general hypoplasia of speech have insufficient stability and volume of attention and limited ability to distribute it. With a relatively safe semantic and logical memory, children with a general hypoplasia of speech have reduced verbal memory and suffer from poor memorisation performance. They forget complex instructions, elements and sequences of tasks.
In children with the first level of speech development, low recall activity can be combined with limited cognitive development.
A study of mnemonic functions suggests that children with a general hypoplasia of speech are significantly worse at remembering verbal stimuli than children without a speech pathology.
A study of attention functions conducted by the authors of the article by A.V. Tivikova and A.S. Filatova shows that children with general hypoplasia of speech quickly tire, need encouragement from the experimenter, have difficulty selecting productive tactics, and make mistakes throughout the work.
Along with general somatic weakness, children with a general hypoplasia of speech are inherent in a certain lag in the development of the motor sphere: movements are poorly coordinated, speed and precision of their performance are reduced. The greatest difficulties are identified in the performance of movements following verbal instructions.
Children with a general hypoplasia of speech have inadequate coordination of movements in all types of motor skills
Children lag behind in the development of verbal-logical thinking and have difficulty mastering thinking operations (analysis and synthesis). Children, have impaired purposeful activity when performing both verbal and non-verbal tasks. They are characterised by a lack of concentration, low level of cognitive activity and a low level of perception of their surroundings, difficulties in establishing cause and effect relationships. Children have the potential to master abstract concepts if they are assisted by a speech therapist. R.E. Levina, T.B. Filicheva, G.V. Chirkina, A.V. Yastrebova note that children with general hypoplasia of speech have insufficient stability and volume of attention, limited opportunities for its distribution. With a relatively secure semantic and logical memory, children with general hypoplasia of speech have reduced verbal memory and suffer from memory productivity. They forget complex instructions, elements and sequences of tasks. Low recall activity may be combined with limited cognitive development. When visually identifying an object under difficult conditions, children with general developmental disabilities perceive the image of the object with some difficulty, they need more time to make a decision, and when answering they show uncertainty and make isolated mistakes in identification. They use elementary forms of orientation when completing the task "equating to the standard". When performing the modeling perceptual task, children with a general hypoplasia of speech are less likely to use the visual correlation method. The study of visual perception suggests that children with a general hypoplasia of speech have an insufficiently developed visual perception. Memorization of verbal stimuli in children with general hypoplasia of speech also suffers.
The study of attention function shows that children with general hypoplasia of speech quickly tire, need a stimulus from the experimenter, have difficulty in choosing productive tactics, and make mistakes throughout the work.
Visual perception, spatial representations, attention and memory are less developed in children with a general hypoplasia of speech. Children with a general hypoplasia of speech are inactive and usually do not show initiative in communication.
Children have disorders of the emotional-volitional sphere, manifested in hypersensitivity, excitability, motor disinhibition, infantilism. Increased fatigue, exhaustion and poor performance are observed. There is a notable lack of cognitive activity. These children often do not notice the task set by the tutor even when the problem situation is specially organised. The questions with which they address the adult most often relate only to external, insignificant aspects of objects. The process of orientation is impaired, which leads to an inactive search for solutions: they are satisfied with the first option they come up with and do not try to find a more adequate one. Children with the general hypoplasia of speech do not try to independently estimate the results of their activity, correlate them with the conditions of the set task; weak self-regulation and purposefulness of behavior, weak concentration of attention are typical, impulsiveness. Constantly asking an adult for help is indicative of weak logical operations, low self-esteem, lack of confidence in their abilities. This leads to children needing constant recognition, praise and appreciation.
Speech deficits affect a child's overall mental development and make it difficult for them to communicate with others.
A fixation on speech impairment creates a sense of inferiority in the child, which in turn makes the child's attitudes towards themselves, their peers, adults and the children's community specific. Speech deficits inhibit the development of play activity, which is known to be of key importance in the formation of a child's personality.
Thus, the data of psychological and pedagogical diagnostics of children with general hypoplasia of speech allow to determine the right system of organization of children in the learning process, to find the most suitable individual methods and techniques of correction for each child.
